Peter Hutton – At Sea
(A restrained Hutton explained onstage that — having spent 10 years as a merchant marine in his youth — he initially wanted to make a film about ship-breaking, the messy and dangerous process by which rusting hulks are broken down into their component elements in cash-starved countries like Bangladesh. After three hours of shooting in one of these ship-breaking yards, he was kicked out, but the usable footage prompted him to construct a trilogy of sorts: the building, voyage and dismantling of a ship.(the reeler – scroll down)
After experiencing mankind’s ability to create such a monstrosity once it’s at sea the camera is locked on to a wide shot of many cargo boxes. I couldn’t help but begin to become concerned with what all those cargo boxes contain. Perhaps some of them are full of grain and other essentials but more than likely they contain garbage that will be consumed and tossed out on to the trash heap, just like the ship that carries them.
At Sea is a 60minute motion picture postcard that delivered an experience distinct in the cinema a un-tethered, by the constraints of conventional story-telling, look at commerce and its consequences. Tim Massett
Part I discussion Peter Hutton had after his retrospective screening at the Capitol Theater in Windsor Ontario for Media City 13 on February 17, 2007 on Youtube.
Thanks Hal Lum for sharing and introducing Peter Hutton to us.